Once of the last few character flaws that I consciously try to work on is the fear of rejection.

It’s funny….knowing this was what I wanted to work on, I found a new therapist and he ended up letting me go, because he thought I was a hedonist. Not only am I a hedonist, but until I decide to release that style of life, I’m going to continue to have issues. I basically told him that with rejection being the core of my issues, I’d have them even if I was a soccer mom. I haven’t been to a therapist since.

So, I just picked up a book to read that I’ve owned for a little while, but haven’t made the time to read. It’s called ‘Don’t Take it Personally! The Art of Dealing with Rejection’ by Elayne Savage, Ph.D. She writes it from her own experience, so so far it’s not academic.

Something struck me in the first couple of pages.

First of all, I find that I define rejection differently than she does. To me, abandonment is an action that someone takes, based on their own issues. Rejection is someone judging something (you), finding them unworthy and then leaving.

For this author, she defines rejection as two ‘specific anxiety tornados’: the fear of being abandoned and the fear of losing our identity. Wow. I didn’t realize they both fell under rejection. I still like my definition, but will play with hers.

The one that intrigues me is the ‘fear of losing our identity’. Boy have I had that! I can remember saying, ‘I’m Dawn. Not Dave and Edie’s daughter. Not Richard’s sister. Not Sister Peek’s granddaughter. Not Mickey’s wife. Not Travis and Alex’s mom.’ Yes, I’m all of those things, but at the core of it all, I’m Dawn. And I was tired of people not remembering my name or knowing me for me.

Yet, today, I’m dawn of ‘Dan and dawn’. I’m Dan’s wife, Dan’s slave. And I’m perfectly fine with that. I’m also slave dawn and Rev. Dawn. I’m fine with that. I feel like I have an identity and people know me for me and for ‘Dan and dawn’. I’m not worried about losing my ever-changing identity. Or so I think. I bet there is some fear there somewhere.

But, understanding this ‘fear of loss of identity’ concept, helps me understand others in my life. When I read that, a lightbulb went off in my head. THAT’S what is going on!!! OH! I understand it now. I don’t particularly like it because it feels like it chisels at my identity, but I understand it.

The experience of being a judge at GLLA this past weekend was pretty surreal. I’ve judged before at a local bar contest and at International, but for some reason the regional seems more important.

At the bar level contest, it wasn’t built to feed into anything and the people running had been coaxed into it. It wasn’t a decision of theirs. So, once I realized they weren’t taking it seriously, I stopped taking it seriously.

At the International level, they’ve already done the work to get there. Regional is where they have to prove themselves. International has them competing against others that have proven themselves at a regional level. AT this point they’ve shown their stuff before and been judged on it. Now ‘it is what it is’. Best foot forward, but if nothing else, ‘I made it to International.’

So, to me, the Regional level is more important. This couple represents the region, the contest producers and the regional community. Knowing this, has me feeling like I’m under a larger spotlight.

I think we had a hard time this time around because there were 3 couples. This is a first for GLLA. And even worse, they were all great couples in their own right. The scoring points were amazingly close. All of us as judges were talking about the closeness, and just decided that we vote with our hearts and let the points fall as they may.

It was also a hard spot for me because I knew one of the couples. It’s hard enough to judge anyone, let alone someone I know and their sad history. I had to keep from crying a couple of times. Some of the judges weren’t so successful with that. Oddly enough I didn’t have an issue with remaining un-biased. That was one of the biggest worry’s.

Another worry was that I wouldn’t fit in. A couple of the judges I didn’t know but there was also Master Z of Dallas and Master Alex Keppler. I’ve chatted with them both bore, but Master Dan has been with me and did most of the talking. In this situation, I was a ‘peer’ as a judge but also slave on a team of mostly Masters. So, there was the potential of messing up and making my Master look bad. He didn’t seem to be worried about it though.

Huh, I just realized that he didn’t give me any rules or guidance about my judging. That’s odd. Or is it because I didn’t ask if he had any requirements. It used to be that I would have asked. So, does that mean that it doesn’t matter? Or that his requirements are so ingrained in me that I don’t have to ask. It better be the latter.

I also had to go through the phase of ‘what will I wear?’. I wanted to wear my corsets but it’s hard to sit in a corset for that many hours though. I know, first world problems.

I did get over my ‘i don’t like to judge people’ thing though....by telling myself that i’m not judging them, i’m judging their actions ....and i want the best couple to represent what it is that i love and to show a good example.